Infant - Problems keeping in liquidy solids

[khaoskat]

Ok - DS3 has swallow difficulties and reflux.  We have started solids and until today have had fairly good luck, but most of what he gets is "thicker" foods, as I generally make my own.  I do use prepared, when I am out and about for ease and convenience.

Today I gave him a jar of peaches, and was going to give him mashed sweet potato, but didn't have any made so I got a comercial jar of it down.  We have just gone with Stage 2 (4 oz jars) foods.  Now, he has had the jarred sweet potato before, but I noticed it was real thick.  Today however it was really runny, even runnier than the pear.  I put a spoonful in his mouth, and he just got all pushed out without him taking any down.  I thought it was a fluke, so tried again.  Any time I tried to put the very runny stuff in his mouth, it was basically pushed/ran out of it. 

I did then go make my own, and when I fed it to him, there was no problem.  I even mixed in some of the opened jar in the food I was giving him instead of liquid to make it a bit thinner.  He had no problems.

Anyone else have a child who does fine with thicker foods (like a mashed sweet potato with nothing added to thin it out) but cannot swallow or suck down the real liquid stuff?

I will say that whenever we give him solids, after the first couple of bits, he has to push his fingers into his mouth after every bit.

[Escoville01]

My daughter is now 2 yrs old andhas had a feeding tube for about 15-16 months. Before that she would all the food you would give her with no problems, we did notice however that with giving her formula in a bottle she would have some run out of her mouth. Not to scare you but ALL of her specialists including her pediatrician said that that was a big sign of aspirating liquids into her lungs and we had to give her only thicker things to eat. If we were going to give her liquids they need to be thickened with something like honey, nectar, or baby cereal. That's when we found out that our daughter has slowed swallow when she tries to take in liquidier substances.

Good luck.

:)

[khaoskat]

Thanks, we already know he has a high risk of aspiration.  He has a significant amount of penetration, but no aspiration.  He has had two swallow studies and failed both.

He does fairly well nursing and on bottles, but what he gets from the bottle is a bit on the thicker side from adding the extra calories to it.

[anj_rn]

My DD passes with purees on her swallow study, but fails liquids. That is fairly common.  It is easier for the mouth to control the thicker liquids.  We use thickeners (yogurt, grains) in her feeds, and Simply thick (prescribed by our doc) on liquids.  She has a g-tube, so most of her nutrition goed through the tube.

[khaoskat]

I guess I should say that he is only 7 months old.  So, not quite yet at the age for yogurt.

As long as I give him the thicker foods, and those not mostly water/liquid he can swallow it down, otherwise it runs out of his mouth.

I want to switch to sippy cups vs bottles, but am not sure how he would do